<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Weeds by XantunsiaRiveresiana</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23629189">Weeds</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/XantunsiaRiveresiana/pseuds/XantunsiaRiveresiana'>XantunsiaRiveresiana</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Gilberti Riveresiana Chronicles [7]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Final Fantasy XIV</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Behind the Scenes, Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward Spoilers, Gen, Illegal Activities, Introspection, Male Miqo'te (Final Fantasy XIV), Original Character-centric, Reminiscing, Short</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 18:28:03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,304</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23629189</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/XantunsiaRiveresiana/pseuds/XantunsiaRiveresiana</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>The unseen gardener, preparing the soil.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Gilberti Riveresiana Chronicles [7]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1700908</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Weeds</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Pluck. Pluck. Pluck.</p><p>"That wasn't the deal!" The self-important plainsfolk shouted, slamming his hands down on the negotiations table. In contrast, his negotiatee on the other side reacted much more calmly.</p><p>"The deal was simply for us to meet the East Aldenard Trading Company with aggression in the Far East. Which we did."</p><p>"Yes but-"</p><p>The calmer one cut off the yelling before it could start "Your plan seems to have been to squeeze into the hole we made in their territory, but there is no need to worry, Anba Xian can do that ourselves."</p><p>The lalafell was seething at this point. Having his ploy called out on him and his pride wounded, he dropped his pretenses. "I gave you the information on their practices you needed! You owe me that hole!"</p><p>"We owe you exactly nothing you conniving filth." The young miqo'te said with just a hint more sternness in his voice. "And yet even still, we allowed you the chance to seize the prize. We gave you the opportunity to fight for it, the fact that you're even alive attests to that."</p><p>The moment after he uttered those words, the Miqo'te was across the long table, sword drawn and resting on the neck of his rival merchant.<br/>The rival, with delayed reaction, seemed to give some sort of signal with his hands.<br/>But nothing happened.</p><p>"Your assassins won't be responding"<br/>Ice filled the threatened merchant as his sword wielding adversary said this.</p><p>"And that's the difference between us at the end of the day, all my men could fall and I would not only fight back, but fight back harder. Your men fall, and all you can do is cower. That's why you lost Othard, that's why you'll always lose. To us, to Lolorito, because you simply lack power Teledji."<br/>With a single swift motion, the swordsman removed his blade from Teledji's throat, sheathed it, and began walking away. He could hear Teledji's mumblings as he left.</p><p>"Power... power... if I just... I could... Omega...! Then they'll see... then they'll...!!"<br/>As he listened in he couldn't stop the monstrous grin from growing on his face.</p><p>Pluck. Pluck. Pluck.</p><p>"But how would we even incapacitate the warrior that felled Nidhogg?" The young Ishgardian questioned his colleagues. Though no one had an answer, the willful woman who seemingly pushed the lot forward chimed in again. "We have to do something, we cant just let these talks of 'peace' go forward without saying our own piece about those damned monsters!"</p><p>"Then might I offer a solution?" A voice from nowhere proffered. This made everyone in the room jump defensively. This meeting was supposed to be in secret, the bar owner had closed up just for that sake. And yet, from the shadows of the dimly lit tavern came a cloaked man with a bottle and an odd sword on his hip. Many of attendees of this meeting were soldiers, so the sight of the sword made them grasp for their own, but the cloaked figure simply put his hands in air in a sign of nonviolent intent. Slowly he approached the table and dropped the bottle in one of his raised hands onto it.</p><p>"You were discussing poisons earlier, but none of you quite had the experience right? Well I can assure you, the person you wish to fell is no ordinary one, as I'm sure you're aware, and no ordinary toxin will take to her system. This cocktail however, she should have no immunity to, it will do the job you seek." The cloaked figure said calmly, like a salesman that knows they've made their sale before they began.</p><p>The would be buyers looked at the bottle uneasily. "We would not have them die." Their leader said, after a long pause. </p><p>The salesman grinned at these words, but his own words seemed to carry with them an air of irritation "no of COURSE not! They are your hero after all! Nidhogg's bane! The one who toppled a thousand years of lies! The outsider who sacrificed more than you could know for the sake of a city hell bent on denying themselves their own salvation!" </p><p>He breathed deep before continuing, clearing the irritated air before he did "you simply don't want their heroics getting in the way of your own agenda right?" </p><p>He then leaned forward and uncorked the potion bottle, looking up at the group as he did so, grinning a morbid grin ear to ear and piercing them with his sun seeker eyes. "Hm, tell me though, what do you think it says about you, that you don't want your hero around when you take action?"</p><p>Whether it was the pressure of his words, or his gaze, the group was unable to stammer out a proper response before the cloaked Miqo'te turned and left saying "be sure to stay true to your true and noble cause though, I have a point to prove." And with that, disappeared into the shadows.</p><p>Pluck. Pluck. Snap.</p><p>"Why do you insist on starving yourself mother...?" The Miqo'te said, casting flower petals aside, verbalizing the irritation his reminiscence was causing him.</p><p>"You share your garden with not just inferior flowers, but with the weeds as well."</p><p>Pluck. Rip. Snap.</p><p>"How much will it take? How much nutrients will you let them siphon away? How many flowers will you let the weeds steal from you?" Lamented the Sun Seeker, discarding flower petals and stem pieces about angrily</p><p>"How long will you let these cancers wound you? Take what is rightfully yours? Dare to grow in your presence when all of the soil is rightfully yours to consume?"</p><p>Rip. Snap. Crunch.</p><p>"Must I keep showing you the truth Mother? What these parasites will steal from you? Weaken you? That your true calling is to devour the whole garden for yourself!?" Shouted the enraged young boy, tearing the bouquet in his hands to shred as he ranted.</p><p>"Ah." He let out, suddenly coming to his senses. </p><p>"I'm sorry, I did truly intend to leave those for you. I owe mother's life to you in the end, as misguided as you were. I truly thought losing you would finally push her over the edge, but I guess because it was you it couldn't have huh?"</p><p>An emotional concoction of annoyance, gratitude, and perhaps even some grief seeped out of Gilberti's words to the grave before him. He had come with many more words for the one who laid there, but could no longer remember them. His thoughts,  unable to process what he was feeling at that moment, or perhaps simply not wanting to, drifting to anywhere but there. He remembered his schemes, his plan to turn his mother into the beautiful monster he knew was in her, to save her from herself. He thought about how frustratingly easy it was to turn the people she risked everything for against her time and time again, and then looked at the grave before him, and thought about how not everyone could be turned against her.</p><p>And about how those ones always died.</p><p>And then, as his emotions swirled in him, he thought back to the island. And the monster that saved him from death. Devastatingly powerful and ruthless. No children to raise, no pack to protect, a single, solitary power decimating all things around it simply by being there. Truly a being impervious to being caused pain.</p><p>And as all of these thoughts cycled through him in but a moment, he solidified his resolution again. Turning the leave the grave just as the decimated flower parts scattered onto the shield by the grave, the faintest hint of wavering can be heard again as the boy pauses a moment, saying to himself "... Better suits a hero ...?"</p><p>Before scoffing in the next.<br/>"What an irritating knight..."</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>